this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2023
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Baby monitor recommendations (midwest.social)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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My wife thinks I'm insane but, what experience do you have with baby monitors and what steps did you take with commercial products to make sure they weren't vulnerable like most IoT garbage out there?

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

I pushed for wireless offline. It gives you a camera and a monitor. Wireless with plenty of range. Two way talk. White noise options on the camera.

The biggest advantage is that it's something you can leave on and open. I know if my baby is coughing or hiccuping or yelling immediately. I'm not getting a little ding on my phone that says my camera heard something. That wouldn't wake me up.

I just got the v tech from Walmart. It was expensive and the best I can say about it is that it's sufficient. We needed one in a pinch. I'd do real research if you go this route.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

We went with a traditional video baby monitor. (8 years ago) No internet. Do they even sell those anymore?

Yeah the security is mostly non-existent, but you at least have to be in the area to screw with it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Isolate all IoT devices on a seperate VLAN.

Back when my child was a baby, I used one of the ptz amcrest cameras that was isolated on it's own VLAN that had no Internet access. This allowed for viewing the camera while connected to a local network or while connected to the local network via VPN.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

interesting idea of VLAN'ing everything to a black hole. I was mulling a Eufy baby monitor. I feel like I remember Eufy being a no-no brand but, I'm willing to hear contrary positions.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Eufy recently had some issues exposed where they were not actually doing end-to-end encryption in all cases even though they said they were. We have used the Eufy E110 with both of our kids and like them. They don't connect to a network, so the security risk is very low in my opinion. We have had issues with the monitor kick stand and flip out antennas breaking if you drop them or aren't careful, but that is user error.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Ah! That was it. I'm not too worried since I didn't plan on connecting it to my wifi.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It worked rather well since the majority of the time it was used was while we were on the same network, or could access it. Interestingly enough, I went out to my garage and still have that camera . Lmk if you'd like it. I don't have any use for it now days. Not sure if it is still supported in their app or if their app still supports the no Internet aspect. The model is IP2M-841W.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Not an irrational fear, remember that the S in IoT stands for Security. Anything that doesn't use wifi/internet is going to be fine, someone would have to physically come to your house to get the signal.

We went with the DXR-8 from Infant Optics. It's a little janky in some ways, like we couldn't have 2 viewers for the same camera for some reason, uses old barrel plugs instead of something like USB-C, and was bad at battery estimation. Overall though, worked for us and the nanny just fine.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

My wife went with a video cam that came with two cameras, one viewing pad thing (with horrendous battery light lmao), and no Internet connectivity.

We just wanted something that wouldn't be hacked from anywhere in the world, and that worked for us.

The only reason to have a Wi-Fi connected model is if you want to view the monitors from outside the house. Honestly I've not had the need nor the desire. If I'm away from my kid, she's with someone I trust. Accidents happen, and there are bad actors, but the relative risk of such things doesn't outweigh my desire to be able to fully unplug if we're on a date night or something. Lord knows if we had the ability to see in on our kid at all times, the temptation to do so would overrun the fun of a night out.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

We just use a regular audio monitor ha